


I'm Gonna Shoot Cthulhu With A Gun

by Falcolmreynolds



Category: Cthulhu Mythos - H. P. Lovecraft
Genre: F/F, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-06
Updated: 2020-06-10
Packaged: 2021-03-04 05:07:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,971
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24568225
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Falcolmreynolds/pseuds/Falcolmreynolds
Summary: Sometimes we want to see a really good big win against apparently unbeatable odds. Against the high and mighty so-called Great Ones. I'm gonna go ahead and make that for all of us, right here.Annie Bradford is 16 when her father dies and she's carted away to gloomy Arkham to live with her reclusive aunt, Mergot Wilkinson. Her life takes a turn for a strange when she meets Florence Baxter, a fellow pupil being tutored by women from Miskatonic University, and finds out that not all in Arkham is as it seems.There's - there's eldritch stuff happening. Obviously.
Comments: 7
Kudos: 13





	1. Prologue

There is much in the world that cannot be described or understood. There is much to marvel at, and there are many things in the world that we must not observe, lest we understand them too deeply.

There is knowledge that exists in the world that is not meant for any mortal mind. There are creatures beyond the scope of the human imagination that must never be understood or revealed, for their very existence can turn a man mad.

There are things in the world that would destroy it, if only the world understood them.

For humans, these things are too vast to comprehend. Those that try to connect to them become extensions of their will, losing all sense of self; and those that try to stop these beings, these entities, these creatures, will inevitably fail; it is the will of the great beyond that the most powerful beings in existence will triumph, and the ants and mice that are humanity will be turned to dust in a breath of cosmic wind.

Those that fight against the Great Ones are always doomed to fail, they say. Those that battle against the servants of the Deeps and the Beyond cannot hope to succeed.

The thing is, those folks ain’t Annie. And Annie’s got a gun.


	2. Arkham Overture

_ “Now, listen, Annie. You can’t stay out here, not even with your father’s friends. It isn’t safe, and besides, your aunt’s got legal custody of you now. That means you have to go stay with her. It’ll only be for a couple of years, and then you can leave, but you’re too young for now to be on your own! I’m sorry. That’s how it has to be.” _

“Damn Aunt Margot,” Annie muttered, to herself. “Damn all of ‘em.”

“What’s that?” said the woman in the carriage with her, glancing over.

“Nothing.”

“Watch your language, dear,” the woman tutted, and Annie furrowed her brow further and pressed her forehead to the cold glass.

_ “I understand that you want to honor your father, but you’re going to have to act a little more in line with proper ladylike behaviour if you’re going to succeed in your new home.” _

“Go away,” Annie muttered, glowering at the fields outside the window.

She could’ve managed the ranch. She knew how her father did it. It wasn’t a very big ranch! She could’ve managed it just fine.

“Now, we’ll be there in perhaps twenty minutes,” the woman said, fussing with a handbag she’d kept on her purse since Annie had gotten into the car two hours ago. “Remember, your aunt is a very important person, so you must be polite to her when you meet her.”

Annie considered ‘go stuff your head in a bucket of horse shite’ but decided that would just earn her a scolding. Instead, she just kept her eyes on the scenery as it whipped by.

Slowly, the fields died away, melting into a suburb. Annie  _ hated _ the suburb instantly, and hated even more the city which quickly overtook it, large buildings and muck and grime and rain.  _ This isn’t real dirt, _ Annie thought, scowling at the gray scum that coated the stonework and windows of the gloomy Massachusetts town.

A lot of the buildings featured high, sharp spires; Annie felt uncomfortable looking at them, as if something were watching her from just behind that carved stone. She shivered.  _ This place is miserable! _

The aunt she was about to meet for the first time was likely just as miserable. Annie could picture her already; stringy yellow hair, watery gray-blue eyes, some kind of somber dress. Something that matched the oppressive air of this damp place.

The car rolled through the streets, juddering over the cobblestones, until it finally reached a large, wrought-iron gate. There it paused, and the driver - a silent, stoic little man with a dark blue-green uniform on - climbed out to open the gate. He drove the car through, then got out and closed the gate again behind him.  _ Why bother? _ Annie thought, twisting around in her seat to look behind them as the car’s engine sputtered and drove it up the large hill.  _ Ain’t like you’ve got anything to keep in here. But there’s walls all around. You just wanna keep other people out? I guess the townsfolk could come in if it were open… _

Annie had never lived in a place with  _ townsfolk _ before. She’d been into towns, sure, but she’d never  _ lived _ in one, and Arkham was no simple town but a city, a machine-riddled jungle of carved stone and twisting iron. The air carried a heavy smell to it, the damp, algal scent of the Miskatonic River.

That was another thing she wasn’t used to. The Southwest was dry, arid. This place was heavy with water. It made her hair curl strangely and her skin feel sticky, and she hated it.

_ This place don’t feel right. _

The car rattled its way up the long drive, underneath black trees, their branches heavy with rain and dead leaves. Autumn, huh? Annie hated it. She didn’t like these seasons. The world shouldn’t have been so damn changeable; there was wet and dry seasons, sometimes snow if the winters got real cold. The weirdness of the trees and the landscape here unsettled her deeply.

The drive went up a shallow hill, but it was so large that by the time they neared the peak of it, the car stood above the rooftops of much of Arkham, spread out around it. Annie realized they were on a ridge; there were several other houses, also tucked away in their own patches of trees, built along the high ground, looking out over the city. 

The house before her resembled the rest of Arkham - tall, pointed, offputting. It was made from the same gray stone and the same black iron as the rest of the city. It didn’t match Annie at all, she felt; she knew she burned with sunlight and gunpowder, not… this. Not this.

_ I don’t belong here. _

The car pulled into a large circular drive that surrounded a large stone basin filled with water, an amorphous sculpture standing in the middle. It wasn’t a fountain, or anything, though. It was just a sculpture and a basin.  _ Maybe it’s broken. _

“Here we are,” trilled the woman in the car. “Mr. Dells, would you be so kind as to get the young lady’s luggage out from the car?”

The short driver wordlessly turned the car off and got out. Annie took this as her cue and opened her own door, nearly knocking it into the man, who neatly sidestepped and marched back to the trunk, which he opened with a little key.

Inside were Annie’s things. She’d been restricted to only a large trunk and a few small bags, and of course, the case carrying her precious Winchester, the one gun they’d let her keep from her father’s small collection. She rested a hand on the case for a moment.

“Dear, dear!” the woman from the car chirped, getting out. “You’re very lucky. Not many people get to meet Ms. Wilkinson! She keeps to herself up here, and they say even when she meets with others, she hides behind a veil! She’s still mourning the death of her husband, you know. Oh! I shouldn’t gossip.”

_ Then don’t, _ Annie thought, forcing herself not to roll her eyes. She hauled the rifle case out of the trunk and held it close to her chest while the driver pulled her steamer out and set it on the ground.

“Do you want me to come up to the door with you, dear?” the woman said.

_ Not anymore. _ “No. I think I can manage that,” Annie said sarcastically, glowering at the woman. “It ain’t too far.”

The woman hesitated for a moment, trying to determine whether Annie was being rude or not. “Well, alright,” she finally said, brow furrowing just a tad. “If that’s what you want, then, dear, I won’t stop you. Is everything of yours out of the car?”

Annie patted her pockets. “Yeah.”

“Yes, not yeah,” the woman corrected absentmindedly. Annie fumed, but did not respond. “Very well, dear. I wish you luck!”

She climbed back into the car, as did the driver, and Annie watched it sputter to life and carry them down the drive, swiftly disappearing into the trees.

The house behind her - a manor, really, it was massive - loomed against the gray sky.  _ Time to meet Aunt Mergot. Hope she ain’t too terrible. _

Slowly, Annie climbed the steps leading up to the door, dragging her trunk behind her with both hands. She set it on the top stoop, then went and got the rifle case and her smaller bags, taking them with her.

That was everything. The meager remnants of her previous life, bundled up and shipped off to a strange place with her. Those were the only things she could cling to, now.

Annie reached up and took hold of the heavy iron knocker; there was one on each side of the door. The metal was cold, ever so slightly damp, and clung to her palms, slightly clammy. Despite herself, she was nervous, and that, she despised. She should have been able to face any danger and come out ahead. She was Annie Bradford, the rancher’s daughter, the gunslinger’s daughter, tough as a desert nettle and twice as sharp. But now here she was smothered under this low gray sky, drowning in river-smell and hunched black trees.

She slammed the knocker against metal plate on the door, several times, a heavy cracking sound that echoed through the house behind it; Annie fancied she could almost hear it in the big, empty halls beyond.

Silence. Then, ever so faintly, footsteps. They sounded softly on wood, then vanished; a carpet inside, perhaps? Annie strained her ears, and jumped when the iron handle of the door moved with a heavy thunk and opened inwards, just a crack.

“Is it just you out there?”

The voice was lower than Annie had expected, and rougher, too. She glanced back - the puttering car was long gone. “Yeah,” she answered, brow furrowing. “S’just me.”

The door opened the rest of the way, silent on its hinges. Standing in the doorway was a tall woman with dark brown skin, though not as dark as her eyes, which nearly matched Annie’s own in color. Her hair sprang freely from her head in a dandelion-like puff of curly dark brown strands. Around her neck was a simple flat golden chain of a necklace, the links incredibly fine, with a single emblem dangling from the center - an uneven star, the lines curved as if drawn by hand, the center a simple oval with pointed ends and a flame-like teardrop in the center, like a small, golden eye. The symbol drew Annie’s eye; she stared at it for a moment, and only after a few silent seconds managed to drag her gaze away and look up to the woman’s face.

“You’re Annie Bradford?” the woman said, raising one eyebrow. Her dress was black, yes, darker than her skin, but embroidered with patterns Annie couldn’t quite see. The sleeves were short, only to her elbows, leaving her forearms free - each one was adorned with a golden band of metal, several inches wide, intricate enameled shapes pressed against her skin.

“That’s me,” Annie replied. She swallowed, suddenly nervous - this woman was nothing like she expected. Nothing at all like what she’d been envisioning. What did she think of Annie, standing here in faded print and denim, with two smooth black braids and a round flat face and a Winchester rifle held close to her chest?

“Finally, a member of my family who has some sense,” Margot Wilkinson said. “You have no idea how long I’ve been waiting for someone like you.”


End file.
